Please remove your link to my post

This morning I had an email in my inbox which sort of puzzled me. It referenced a blog post made on the very first iteration of this blog right here several years ago. Before I started taking classes to earn my Library Tech diploma, even.

Salutations,

I am Ted, and I am writing you on behalf of CollegeInfoWebsiteHere. It has always been our goal to produce and provide the most useful and up to date information on online colleges. We want to help take the stress out of the decision making process. We also provide pages and blog posts with random, weird, and amusing facts for distraction.

It is these pages that have us concerned. We have kept an eye on changes made to linking and webmaster standards, and we fear our blog posts will soon be seen as irrelevant fluff. Therefore, though I am glad you linked to us on FirstIterationofMissScarletHere, I must ask that you remove any links leading to the pages of CollegeInfoWebsiteHere. They can be found on FirstIterationofMissScarletHere/archivepost.

Thank you,
Ted FirstFirstNameIsntReallyTedAnyway

Here is my not-really-a-problem-but-what-I'm-thinking-about-anyway:

• The post my old post links to still exists. You click the link, their post is still there. 
• If you search up some keywords you will still find that post on their site. 
• Does having a link to their site from my site bump where their site comes up in, say, a web search? Signs point to yes, though this version of my site hardly causes internet tube clogs, much less that first version. But it's there and that contributes to search results.
• I can change the content of my post to not link to their site or even mention their site name. However, I still find the content of their post applicable/interesting and I still have an opinion on it (which is positive, though yes, it is a fluff post). If I ditch the link and the name, I then have uncited content. 'This one website has a post that I found interesting and here are the parts I found interesting, but no, you can't verify that without, say, searching the text from their post or the keywords involved'.
• I don't like having uncited content. It makes it look like I'm trying to pass off the work of others as my own instead of just finding the work of others and pointing to it/expressing my thoughts/opinions about said content.
• I am happy with the content of my site.
• They are not happy with the content of their site.
• They have not removed the post they do not want linked. 
• Should they delete their post, I then have a broken link. Would I rather be the person who runs a library-related blog with a broken link or the person who runs a library-related blog with a very vague reference to another blog? Or would I rather be the person who deletes their old blog post entirely?

If I'm happy with my site content and they are not happy with their site content, isn't the onus on them to change their content?



I started making websites and posting things to the internet when I was all of fourteen years old. Back then, I didn't have a concept of how long things would stick around and how things I posted would remain pretty much forever in one form or another. That was the mid-90s, however, and that girl hadn't even told Mark Zuckerburg off. Zuckerburg's voice may not have even changed by that point.




Someone who put up a post a few years ago doesn't so much have that excuse.


I like being polite. I like common courtesy. I will likely take my old post down, and I don't think it will break a bunch of links in the websites of others. I just find the situation interesting. Thoughts?

Open cover letters

I recently had to write a cover letter. I don't particularly enjoy writing them; I don't like to toot my own horn. Despite that, apparently they were impressed by the cover letter and it may have been what got me an interview. Anyway, here is a site with cover letters from anonymous cover letters from hired librarians and archivists. I may have snagged this from Only connect a while ago.

The five stages of disruption denial

Yoinked from a LinkedIn group, The five stages of disruption denial. Originally I clicked on this when all I could see was 'the five stages of disruption' and I thought it was some kind of awesome new SHUSHING TECHNIQUE. As in, when do you step in to shush? How do you shush? However, this Harvard Business Review blog article is actually about adapting to and adopting change. In this case: Twitter. Which reminds me:

"Game of Thrones reminds me of Twitter a lot because there are 140 characters and terrible things are constantly happening"

Thing 5 - Reflective Practice

Reflective practice is 'reviewing the experiences we have, learning from them and applying what we have learnt'. It reminds me of field trip reports, which I have mostly bulled my way through as a student. This happened. This happened. I liked this. I learned this. Almost like a fill-in-the-blanks exercise, really.

It also reminds me of maybe a step beyond my note-taking practices. I point form the heck out of things I'm being told and sometimes write myself little questions at the bottom of the page, most of which still make sense days later. Something about formalizing this process makes me roll my eyes a little. I'm not quite sure why. I imagine it's probably handy when attending conferences, something I have still managed not to do.

So, reflecting on CPD23:

1. Blogging: check, have been doing that for years.
2. Other Blogs: found some new ones!
3. Personal Brand: formalized this further with the new CPD23 blog.
4. Current Awareness: already used RSS feeds/readers, trying Twitter again and still not liking it much, haven't done much of anything with PushNote.

One aspect of CPD23 I have appreciated has been the increased traffic to my blog. My old blog never got this many views. It helps that my frequent posting lands me on the CPD23 sidebar fairly often; I get a lot of referrals from that site. I have followers! That's nutty! But will people continue reading when CPD23 is done? I must charm everyone NOW.

The nudge toward commenting has also paid off. I feel a little more like a member of a community, though I have a long way to go. That was something I never felt as a lone blogger. I'm still not managing one comment a day, but it's still much better than never commenting at all.

I think CPD23 covers quite a few things I already do, but prompts me to put more effort into doing them.

So now what? Well, if anyone has recommendations for Twitter feeds to follow, I'm all ears. Eyes. Whatever.

Making Blog Posts People Will Actually Read

Another from Geeks Are Sexy: How to write posts that people will actually read by Sterling Camden. Some pretty basic stuff. In summary:

1. Post about things you care about.
2. Read up on them.
3. Catchy titles are good!
4. Challenge your readers/ask for feedback
5. Be funny.
6. Use examples.
7. Link your sources.
8. Add your own insights.
9. Choose conclusions wisely.
10. Don't go on too long.

I would tentatively add use pictures. Images make things stand out in my RSS feed reader and generally get my attention. I rarely use images. I keep meaning to use more, especially when I read other blogs and see the clever/funny images they've used. It's extra effort is the thing.

One thing I find about adding my own insight to topics is that I don't so much have insight to share yet. I mostly say, 'this is a great idea' and leave 'er there.

10 Reasons Geeks Should Blog

Last one for today, I promise! From Geeks are Sexy, 10 Reasons Why Geeks Should Blog.

If you are interested in library studies, there is a good chance you're a geek. Or at least if you're a student there's a good chance you're a geek, from what I can tell from my fellow classmates. And by 'geek' I don't necessarily mean video-game playing, t-shirt wearing, socially awkward Star Trek fans - I mean people who get really excited about atypical things, like puzzles or Elvis memorabilia or, say, books. Anyway, guest blogger Chris Garrett provides the following ten reasons, which apply to library bloggers, too:

1. Clout from search engines. Google your name, get your website right up there in the results.
2. Career – "Once you have a good archive of wisdom to share, it can be of great help for your career, for furthering your job opportunities or getting freelance work."
3. Education - Stay up to date with industry changes and news.
4. Opportunities – Getting your name more well-known and your thoughts spread brings a wealth of opportunities, from startup gigs, freelance work, to speaking engagements and book deals.
5. Gadgets – "It is not all business and careers. Many bloggers get sent free gadgets to review. In my case, the freebies tend to be books, but hey… it’s all good!"
6. Attention – If people listen to what you say, people will want you to say more.
7. Communication – Yay interpersonal skills!
8. Networking – Who you know! Maybe you're better online than you are in person, but it still helps.
   
9. Writing – A geek who can write is a more valuable geek.
10. Money

Okay, numbers five and ten are in the realm of fantasy. I like how the author says he mostly 'only' gets books, like that's not great.

That list just has a summary; it's worth reading the full article. Cheers!

Tales from the Library

Essentially a bookmark - Tales from the Library, a site dedicated to your wacky library stories. Your wacky anonymous library stories, even. There isn't so much there, so please contribute! I know some of you out there must have things to share. Things I need to know.

Librarified Minecraft

Hey look, I found a new blog to follow, Librarified! (At least go look at the design, it's lovely and very distinctive and fun.) Read about an awesome Minecraft competition at her library. There's even a review policy, which implies the author, Gretchen Kolderup, actually has enough people giving her books for free that she needs a policy about it. I guess I gotta do more book reviews! Or I suppose I should start by reading more reviews to figure out how to write good ones.

Which library bloggers do you aspire to be like? Which ones inspire you? This could be your comment of the day!

Thing 3 - Personal Brand

Time for Thing 3!

Thing 3 is all about 'maintaining a consistent image' and 'portraying an accurate reflection of who you are'. You are prompted to 'consider your core values and how you can convey those messages to those who meet you in person and those who find you online'. Things to consider include the following:

1. Name - Is it a nickname? Is it consistent across various platforms? If it's not your real name, try using something easy to pronounce.
2. Photograph - Do you want to be recognized when you meet face to face? Probably. Consider using a recent photo of yourself instead of a cartoon or other image.
3. Professional/personal identity - Do you want to merge the two or will you keep them separate?
4. Visual brand - do you have a clear visual identity? This could be the colours you use, a style of imagery, or anything that makes you stand out/be unique. It should also be consistent across platforms.

My answers bleed into each other, so have a big block of text:

I don't like attaching my real name to things online, where it can be around forever and ever. This is perhaps a product of being on the internet since I was fourteen. Never give personal info! Ever! Sometimes I toy with the idea of using my real name, but I can always go public later. And if you really really want to find me, you probably could. In which case you might be a stalker, which is not good. But at least I made you work for it!

Miss Scarlet was my favourite character in Clue. I always thought she was pretty and mysterious (let's face it, she's kind of a babe). Red is one of my favourite colours. Red is bold and memorable. I decided to start wearing red to any function with library folks I'd want to network with - a red cardigan or a bright red necklace. I thought that people might associate me with the colour; that girl in red seems familiar... That sort of idea. (I haven't worn red for the last clutch of library-related outings, for which I am sad. This means I am constantly peering into store windows looking for red things. Red things on sale, to be specific.) I wanted red to be a visual brand. The latest copy of my resume has a red sidebar. I changed my old blog's colour scheme to red and white, and from there stepped to transitioning between the old blog (Lagomorph Watson) and this new one, also red. I don't really expect anyone to pick up on the clothing choices, but I'm hoping it's working on a subconscious level. Is that silly?

As for images, I don't have a personal one at the moment. I'm sticking with the Clue theme for now, with a scan of Miss Scarlet's character card for my profile image and the black outline of a woman with a gun on my sidebar. I have some ideas for incorporating my real picture in, but I'll admit I'm shy about that sort of thing and I'll have to push myself.

I'm still trying to figure out professional versus personal. Mostly I try to be professional but hopefully amusing, and every so often I throw that out the window and put up a comic or link to a silly story. Okay, more than every so often. I try to think of what a potential employer might think if they happened across my blog; because I'm so new - I'm a student, not even out there very much yet - that I don't want to be off-putting until I've got some experience to back me up. On the other hand, I want my blog to reflect my personality. I do not care if it reflects what I had for lunch or how I feel about my dog. I don't even have a dog.

As for visual style, I like to keep things clean and simple, hence the basic colour scheme and use of white space. I'm more concerned with my blog being readable than pretty, and I want it to look like something you can leave on your screen if your boss is walking by. The lady with the gun might not work that way, but she's thematic.

In short: red, red, red, red.

CPD23 Thing 2: Other Blogs

I've been poking around and adding other blogs to my Google Reader. There's a long list of participants, so it's hard to choose blogs to peek at! I've been going by blog names I like, mostly. Here are a few I've looked at:

• Lauren's Library Blog
• London Library Girl
• Nouveau Librarian
• Odd Librarian Out
• ook librarian
• Rachel's Smaller CPD23 Adventure
• Sarah Said Library

I'm still looking for others. Odd Librarian Out has a good idea - try to post one comment a day. That might help my comment shyness!

Hey, are there other students out there doing CPD23? Leave me a comment! Leave me a comment even if you're not a student.

Seth Godin On The Future of the Library

A link for personal reference: Seth Godin's blog post on the future of the library. I have a feeling I might quote it for a school project someday. It has some very good points, succinctly written.

The library is no longer a warehouse for dead books. Just in time for the information economy, the library ought to be the local nerve center for information. (Please don't say I'm anti-book! I think through my actions and career choices, I've demonstrated my pro-book chops. I'm not saying I want paper to go away, I'm merely describing what's inevitably occurring). We all love the vision of the underprivileged kid bootstrapping himself out of poverty with books, but now (most of the time), the insight and leverage is going to come from being fast and smart with online resources, not from hiding in the stacks.

The next library is a house for the librarian with the guts to invite kids in to teach them how to get better grades while doing less grunt work. And to teach them how to use a soldering iron or take apart something with no user serviceable parts inside. And even to challenge them to teach classes on their passions, merely because it's fun. This librarian takes responsibility/blame for any kid who manages to graduate from school without being a first-rate data shark.

My First Dictionary

Today's loosely library related link is My First Dictionary, which makes me laugh because I am just that kind of person. It looks a lot like the simple dictionary I had as a kid which had illustrations demonstrating the meaning of words. The format is similar, but the content is not.

As you can see, the font on the images is pretty large, so maybe don't look at the site with someone looking over your shoulder who might be offended by terms like 'dead hookers'.

Get Off My Lawn and Blog

Verne G. Kopytoff write for the The New York Times: Blogs Wane as the Young Drift to Sites like Twitter.

Fewer kids are blogging now and instead turning to Twitter and Facebook to express themselves, which seems kind of sad. Twitter's 140 character cap on posts is just too small. Facebook's limits are better, but I suppose I'm still sad to see blogging on the decline.

Former bloggers said they were too busy to write lengthy posts and were uninspired by a lack of readers. Others said they had no interest in creating a blog because social networking did a good enough job keeping them in touch with friends and family.

The article goes on to make some interesting points about Facebook and Twitter being used in a complementary manner with Blogs to advertise and get word of mouth out as well as stating older folks don't tend to defect as much.

David Lee King's 10 Presentation Tips

As I continue with my library science program, I'm finding that presentations are being stressed as important. I wasn't expecting that when I entered the program! Librarians - all kinds - have to learn how to make good presentations. They have to learn how to make people believe something they didn't believe yesterday; it's a survival technique to make sure libraries and librarians (and information specialists) keep getting funding and keep getting acknowledged as important.

Some people in my program are better at presentations that others. They tend to be the ones who volunteer to present for group projects, and you can see their skills improve with each presentation. Those presentations help them stand out from the crowd, give them practice with selling their ideas, or ideas in general. It's like being a wallflower at a dance - sure, you might be more comfortable, but you're more likely to be overlooked.

I don't like presenting. I'm not afraid of it and I am willing to do it and I make myself volunteer to do it, but I can't say I find it fun very often (Children's Readership Advisory book presentations are an exception). I'm not all that outgoing a person, either; I'm pretty shy. (Yes, a shy librarian. Who'd've thought?) I guess my tip would be to treat presentations of any sort as a performance: you are acting, you are pretending to be a presenter, and your acting can trick people into thinking you're comfortable.

David Lee King is a much more accomplished presenter than I am, and he has a whole list of tips for presenting.

10 Tips to Do Presentations Like Me:

1. Don't Use Templates
2. Use Presenter Notes
3. Use Presenter View
4. Learn Your PC
5. Use Screenshots
6. Do What You Said You'd Do
7. Tidy up Those Transitions
8. Rehearse
9. Interact with the Audience
10. It's a Performance

Oh hey, look at that last one.

New Librarian Blogs to Watch in 2011

From LISNews: Tell Us About Your Favourite New Librarian Blogs.

I can only assume my lack of inclusion on this list is due to this blog not being new. Or the fact that I am not a full-fledged library tech. That's okay. That's fine, it is, my feelings aren't hurt. Much.

I kid.

In any case, welcome to any new readers or pokers or peerers from 2010. Keep reading in 2011, bookmark, tell your friends, and be sure to check out the blogs suggested above, too.

LISNews: Ten Stories That Shaped 2010

Back in 2009, LISNews posted their list of the ten stories that shaped that year and this blog covered at least half of them! When it was only three months old!

LISNews has posted their list for 2010, which includes:

1. YouTube Sensations
   
2. Libraries and DVDs and Netflix, Oh My
   
3. Piracy Crackdown
   
4. Under New Management
   
5. Gizmo of the Year: iPad
   
6. I For One Welcome Our New Media Overlords
   
7. Web 2.0 Fatigue
   
8. Sign of the Times: Libraries = Offices for Unemployed
   
9. Google eBookstore Opens
   
10. Wikileaks Freakout
    

While I did not bother posting about the Old Spice Guy bit, I did have a mock version. I also had Gordon Pinsent reads Bieber, which wasn't a sensation but should have been. I will count that as one.

I didn't bother with the story about DVDs and Netflix, mostly because we didn't even have Netflix in Canada until recently. Nothing about the specific piracy concerns mentioned in LISNews, but a bit aboutWarner getting sued for Antipiracy Piracy as well as Confessions of a Book Pirate. Something about calling for new privacy laws as well. Maybe point five?

Outsourcing libraries! That's a solid one!

I made fun of iPads but failed to report on how libraries were using them. Point five. New media, case covered, one point. Web fatigue? The last time I mentioned it was in 2009 in a disparaging manner. I still think there's too much arm-flappy wailing, so no point there.

While I mentioned libraries being important for the unemployed and their job searches in at least one college essay, I failed to mention it here as far as I know - that's another zero. I talk about Google so often I have a 'google again' tag. Believe it or not, I actively try not to constantly blog about Google, so I did not mention this topic. Zero! One mention of WikiLeaks, but nothing on the freakout. No point there.

The total is... 4. Oh, how the mighty have fallen.

Books in Browsers Conference

And now that I've sung the praises of book-based social media sites, here is an excerpt from this article about the Books in Browsers conference.

Nicole Ozer of the Northern California ACLU spoke eloquently on the dangers of gathering data on what people read. “If you build it, someone will come calling, asking for information.” Other speakers, though, argued that many readers will trade some amount of privacy in exchange for more features and greater possibilities. If a website helps you find the next book you want to read, perhaps giving it your reading history or some portion thereof is a price worth paying.

Nicole Ozer also writes Bytes and Pieces, which seems to be all about technology and civil liberties and will probably be incredibly useful for one project or another.

Happy Blogiversary

This blog turns one year old today!

Over the past year, I have blogged kind of almost sort of every day, with large gaps. I am talking to myself pretty much. The blog has been renamed once and moved once. A Twitter feed has been added, allowing me to talk to myself even more. Awesome!

(Also, hi Natasha if you actually did make good on your threatpromise to drop by.)

Sweet Valley High Drinking Game

Oh, wow. My sister had a pretty long run of the Sweet Valley High books and I wound up reading them as a kid. They seemed okay at the time, even if they were girly (ewww), but in hindsight some of that stuff was just awful. Erin at Forever Young Adult has been rereading the books and reviewing them. With a drinking game!

I did not remember how crazy this stuff was.

Regina, having never experienced cocaine before even though her mom was a model and her parents are rich and she went to school with rich kids all her life, is all “why are you carrying around powdered sugar?” Everyone makes fun of her ignorance, which leads her to deciding to sample the cocaine. She snorts two lines, and then has a heart attack and dies.

Man, Regina Morrow kicking the bucket. That was maybe the one storyline that I can actually remember! It was sad, because Regina was so pretty. Or something like that. Anyway, if you ever read these books, this is hilarious. It's hilarious even if you just want to see what Young Adult fiction was like in the 80's. Not quite Degrassi crazy, but pretty crazy nonetheless.

Turn Your Blog Into a Book?

Having just finished another post, an ad on the 'yay you just published a post' page caught my eye:

Turn your blog into a book!
Blog2Print from SharedBook turns your blog into a soft cover or hard cover book. You pick the cover, add an optional dedication, then preview and you're done. Prices start at $14.95.

Now I'm wondering what the difference between a blog and a journal is. I could pay $14.95 (and probably more, since that's USD and I'm Canadian) and get my blog published as a book with real, actual pages I could smell. And absolutely none of the links would work, and none of the articles linked would be included, and isn't that the point of a blog? Isn't it just a journal otherwise? If you make a new word for a new thing, use that word properly and don't lump other things in with that word.